Sanders Surging In Polls Both In Iowa And Nationally

January 11, 2016 — Ron Chusid

As she tried, and failed, eight years ago, Hillary Clinton has been running a campaign based upon inevitability. There’s no need to pay any attention to the young/old guy running against her as there was no chance she would lose. Just look at her big lead in the polls. Except now that lead has dwindled away.

As Iowa is a caucus and not a primary, I also wonder what would happen with Martin O’Malley’s supporters as, assuming this poll result holds, he would not have enough support to meet the fifteen percent threshold. His supporters would have to go to their second choice. If a majority of his supporters go to Sanders, this could be enough to give Sanders the victory.

Or maybe he won’t need to pick up O’Malley’s support. An American Research Group poll has Sanders leading Clinton 47 percent to 44 percent. He also leads in New Hampshire by the same margin.

Previously I though that Clinton would maintain her lead in the national polls until the Iowa or New Hampshire votes and then Sanders would start moving up nationally if he won there. He might not even need to wait for this. The IBD/TIPP Poll has Clinton’s lead over Sanders nationally at 4 points, down from an eighteen point lead.

The IBD/TIPP Poll shows that regionally, Clinton saw her support drop most in the Northeast (where it fell to 36% from 50%) and the West (37% down from 49%). Sanders now holds the lead in both places. Clinton support also tumbled among suburban voters, dropping to 39% from last a month’s 50%. And she has lost backing among moderate Democrats, falling to 44% from 58%. Sanders picked up 10 points among moderates, to 37%.

Polls before primaries have a poor track record of predicting the winner, and the final results could be quite different from what we are seeing today. I also wouldn’t be surprised to see both candidates moving up and down in the polls over the next few weeks.

What this does show is that the this is a race either candidate can win, and a Clinton victory is not inevitable. The growing number of polls which show Sanders doing better than Clinton in head to head match-ups against Republicans further undermines Clinton’s argument.